The true answer is that nobody knows exactly how well you proposed specs would run. I personally run a test machine consisting of a P4 and a half gig RAM. I can diskless boot 2 other machines and have them play movies with no jitter. If Kubuntu can recognize everything your server has, you should be good to go otherwise.

Rebuilt MCE 1.1 only this time I went for broke and installed everything (which meant having a hybrid core/media director). No problems.

The intercom function simply does *not* work not matter what combination of buttons I click.

From the core, I can dial direct to MD#1 from the core and everything works; I can talk to someone sitting at MD#1 through the core. The same intercom loop I mentioned above is still present. For example, click the Intercom button from the core and click MD#1 when asked who you would like to call. At the next screen, you'll be asked where you would like to call from. Choose to "place a call from here" does absolutely nothing. If you choose to place the call from the core, it loops you back to the previous screen asking you whom you'd like to call. Broadcasting to all media directors does nothing but send you to a screen with a clickable button marked "End Broadcast".

If I can directly dial a MD, the intercom should work by contrast.

As for MythTV, it detects my card as HT878. I admit I haven't worked with MythTV very much and I haven't actually researched whether or not this card will even work with MythTV.

I would install XP first but configure it to install onto a partition (size is up to you, if anything go 10 gigs). When XP is installed, install Kubuntu onto the second unpartitioned space. Kubuntu's bootloader (grub) should detect that you have XP and configure it accordingly so you can boot into XP or Kubuntu.

Once you succeed at that, boot into Kubuntu again and install MCE normally.

Core w/ MCE 1.1 minimum (just core software installed, nothing installed to make it a media director), no problems installing. Two diskless machines have successfully booted from the core (we'll call them MD1 and MD2, both identical machines in terms of hardware. Audio works.)

1) Intercom: I want to be able to talk into MD1 and have my voice heard on MD2. -How exactly is this done step by step? From MD1, I've tried Intercom --> place call to MD2 --> place call from MD1 and it loops me back to the screen asking where I wish to place the call to. -How can I test if the built in microphone is even working? -Do I need a mailbox configured first?

2) MythTV: I want to watch TV from MD1 or MD2 from the core which has a TV tuner card -Do I need the full MCE install?

Most of my installation issues have been because of updates (mostly pluto-dcerouter related). Luckily I was able to figure out early the reason why MCE wasn't working exactly as I figured from a 1.0 product and it wasn't because of my limitations with Linux. It was MCE itself. I'm hoping in the 1.1 release that the ability to update *anything* package-wise on the box is turned off by default. This is an assumption, but if 1.1 works great and has been tested with Kubuntu, why screw with that with package updates that may break aspects or all of MCE? Release 1.1 with a feature freeze and get the fundamentals working (i.e., MythTV) for 1.2.

Personally, I've had fun installing MCE. Whenever I see an old PC nowadays, I say, "Cool. A media director."